Monday, February 3, 2014

Pasta with Mushroom Sauce

This pasta dish looks simple, even rustic or humble. Its
preparation, however, involves a few tricks that may seem fiddly to busy cooks
but which are totally worth the little bit of extra time and talent to create
absolutely amazing flavor. Yes, while this photo may make Pasta with
Mushroom Sauce look like brownness personified, that brownness has a lovely intensity
of flavor that you may not find in any other brownness (without chocolate, that
is.)

The sauce for this dish is all familiar, easy-to-find
ingredients that just need a little love to get them to sing. Diced onions,
carrots and celery (aka mire poix )
are cooked in a touch of butter, then boiled down with some red wine until the liquid
is almost gone. Next beef consommé is added to give the sauce a deep beef
flavor (I’m guessing that if you’re a veal stock kind of person, this would be
the place to use that).

But then, and here’s the most fiddly part of this recipe,
the sauce is strained, the vegetables having given all we need from them. The
resulting liquid is intensely flavorful, but, wait! There’s more! In the form
of sautéed mushrooms that get to absorb some of that beefy sauce even while
lending some of their earthy essence to it. Yum.

I used cremini mushrooms, but you could use others that you
like. I probably wouldn’t use anything particularly exotic or delicate, but
would stick to the sort of “utility” mushrooms like white button mushrooms or
portabellos, which are just grown-up creminis anyway. For the wine, I used a
Cabernet Sauvignon from California, but any dry red wine that you like is
appropriate. Not only is the wine going to add a lot of its own flavor to your
final dish, but since the recipe only calls for one cup of it, you might want
to drink the rest with your meal, and would, therefore, be better off with one
you like. If you don’t know what you like a dry red wine blend from one of the
popular (ie, pretty cheap) brands will probably make a good sauce.

I made this dish years ago and have really wanted to try it
again. I don’t know what the delay has been. It’s at least as delicious as I
remember it, although I think it would be even better with a higher sauce to
pasta ratio. Next time I make it, I’ll try using less pasta to make a saucier
dish. The range of 6 to 8 ounces of pasta in the recipe below reflects this
thought.

While I served this as a main dish, I think it would be
fabulous served alongside a steak or roast beef. It’s earthy enough to
accompany a casual meal, but fabulously flavorful enough to make that meal a
bit special. Because you know there’s one of those mushy holidays coming up
that might just call for a special meal made especially for someone special.
Just saying.

If you’re good at
timing your recipes, you can begin cooking the pasta while the sauce is
cooking. If you’d rather not have dueling burners, simply cook the pasta first
and either keep it warm or run hot water over it just before mixing with the
sauce.

A sprig or two of
fresh thyme would be a good replacement for the dried thyme if you happen to
have some.

Since I thought I may
like this dish a bit saucier, I adapted the recipe to include the option of
using less pasta over which to stretch the sauce.

6-8 ounces uncooked short-cut pasta (I used whole wheat
penne)

2 tablespoons butter, divided

½ cup finely chopped onion

¼ cup finely chopped celery

¼ cup finely chopped carrot

¼ teaspoon salt

1 ½ tablespoons tomato paste

1 cup dry red wine

1/8 teaspoon dried thyme

1/8 teaspoon black pepper

1 (10 ½ ounce) can beef consomme

8 ounces cremini mushrooms, sliced

1 tablespoon water

1 teaspoon cornstarch

1. Cook pasta in boiling salted water until tender. Drain
and keep warm. (See note above with regard to this step.)

3. Add the wine and bring to a boil. Cook until the mixture
is very thick because most of the liquid has evaporated, about 10 minutes.

4. Stir in the dried thyme, black pepper, and beef consommé.
Bring to a boil and cook until the mixture is reduced to about 1 cup. This
should take 3-5 minutes. Strain the mixture through a sieve, retaining the
liquid and discarding the solids.

5. Reduce the burner heat to medium and return the pan to
the heat. Melt the remaining tablespoon butter. Add the mushrooms and cook,
stirring frequently until golden brown, about 5 minutes.

6. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, combine the water and
cornstarch. Set aside.

7. Add the reserved liquid mixture to the mushrooms in the
pan. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for about 5 minutes. Stir in
the water-cornstarch mixture and bring just to a boil.